Lachenmann uses conventional resources in unconventional ways (he once described his approach as ‘instrumental musique concrete’) finding unorthodox ways to coax sounds out of instruments that they were not designed to make, and then arranging them into coherent form. In Guero a piece for piano - the strings are rarely sounded, Pression, for cello, is a mysterious catalogue of extended techniques and Ein Kinderspiel is a masterclass in getting a great deal musically and intellectually - out of almost nothing by using a combination of imagination, ingenuity and wit. It’s not a matter of technique; as the name implies, a child could do it. The point is only a grown up would have the mind to.